Summer Reading

School is almost out! It's time to visit your local bookstore and grab a few books for young readers. Last week I passed along selections to my niece and nephew. I hooked them up with Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry, Skellig by David Almond, Monster by Walter Dean Myers, and The Road by Cormac McCarthy. The Road? Yep, it's the odd man out in the group, but I think my nephew will appreciate the story. Plus, it's going to be a movie soon, and one should always read the book before seeing the movie, right? Hopefully they'll read many more than these four works, but I think the collection is a good start.

It's always fun to search for a gift read with a particular person in mind. But it's tricky, too. You have to make the right selection or your influence on the reader's habits will be critically compromised. Take The Pickwick Papers for example. It's one of my all-time favorites, but I doubt 800+ pages of Dickens will hold much curb appeal for cool kids on the go, go, go.

I'm a big fan of broccoli, but when I was a kid, not so much.
So get the young people in your life excited about reading.
Steer them toward great books.
But not broccoli books, they'll eat those when they're ready.